Paul Gilbert, ANMF (Vic Branch) Assistant Secretary
Public sector members who took parental leave between November 2018 and July 2020 may need to take action to have your leave counted for long service leave purposes. The deadline to do so is 22 August 2022.
Under the 2020-2024 Public Sector Nurses and Midwives EBA parental leave counts as service for long service leave purposes, in certain circumstances.
Parental leave taken after 1 July 2020 automatically counts as service, and you shouldn’t need to do anything to have this service recognised.
Parental leave taken before 1 November 2018 does not count as service (but does not break service).
Parental leave taken between 1 November 2018, and 1 July 2020, according to the EBA, requires you to make a request to your employer. However, following discussions between the ANMF and the VHIA (who represent public health services) it has been determined that no request is necessary, unless you have changed employers on or after 1 November 2018.
This is because you need an updated Certificate of Service from your previous public sector employer that recognises the parental leave you took while working there.
What do you mean by ‘recognised for LSL purposes’?
This means that the parental leave, paid and unpaid, counts as service.
For example, if you commenced employment at Eastern Health in March 2010, and took 24 months parental leave in 2019, under the old EBA as at March 2022 you would have 10 years’ service (as the parental leave didn’t count) whereas under the 2020-2024 EBA those two years would count, and you would have 12 years’ of service.
Each year of service equates to about 1.7 weeks of LSL.
Who must complete the request?
Anyone who took parental leave on or after 1 November 2018 with a previous employer and wants that service recognised for LSL purposes.
Is there a cutoff date?
Yes. Six months after the new EBA legally commenced which was 23 February 2022, so not later than 22 August 2022.
What should the email say?
ANMF recommends you cut and paste the following into an email, completing the shaded areas, and send to your previous employer:
<Insert Date>
<Insert Name of Manager>
<insert Title>
Delivered by E-mail: <insert email address
Dear <insert name>
Request for updated Certificate of Service
I am employed in accordance with the Nurses and Midwives (Victorian Public Sector)(Single Interest Employers) Enterprise Agreement 2020-2024 (Agreement).
In terms of identification, my employee number is/was <insert number> and/or my date of birth is <insert date of birth>.
Request
The Agreement contains a provision at 70.11 whereby I can request a revised Certificate of Service to reflect that any period of unpaid parental leave taken on or after 1 November 2018 is now recognised as service for the purpose of calculating Long Service Leave.
I have taken unpaid parental leave during this period so require a revised Certificate of Service.
Process
Please forward my request to the Payroll Department so that the Certificate of Service can be generated and sent to me.
Contact details
My contact details have not changed/ My contact details have changed to <insert new contact details>.
Kind regards
<insert name>
<insert contact details>
If you do not receive an updated Certificate of Service within four weeks of your request, please contact ANMF via a Member Assistance Team inquiry form.
